Halo: Corrupted Obsidian
by jiStraightRazor
Summary: Set after Halo 3, MC and Cortana crashland on a strange planet, gaining new allies....and new enemies. will they help stop this threat and make it home? Read and review. Chapter one is up, 2 is in the works.


_**Chapter I: **_Ghosts in the Dark…

The back of the _Forward Unto Dawn _was dead in space without the power for its main engines. Cortana knew this. She also knew that chances were slim to none that they would be found. She was determined, however, to increase their chances as much as she could by increasing the signal's strength. She was silent for a few cycles and monitored John's life signs. For the first time in ages, they were within normal human parameters. He was resting, and this pleased Cortana. They had finished their mission; broken the Covenant and destroyed all active flood spores. Five halos still existed out there though, and this bothered Cortana. Gamma and Delta halos both had flood on them, it was likely the others did as well. Any potential flood infection meant the galaxy was still in danger. But stuck on this ship, they could do nothing to stop it.

A ping response distracted Cortana from her thoughts. She opened the ship's sensors and felt the ping again. It was coming from a nearby planet. If Cortana's eyes were real they would be wide with surprise. She fired the ship's thrusters slightly and descended into the planet's gravity well. She closed the cargo bay as the _Forward Unto Dawn_ picked up speed. She could feel the ship catch fire as the sealed atmospheric chambers in the ship still intact popped and flared. She expended all of her remaining fuel on the prow's thrusters trying to slow their descent. The ship nevertheless reached terminal velocity but was lucky enough to land in a large lake. The water splashed miles into the sky and rained down like a torrent on the surrounding terrain.

Water dripped down into the cryo bay as Cortana assessed damage and examined her surroundings. The ship lay on the bottom of the lake; it had numerous hull breaches and was flooding fast. The bay was leaking but for the most part still secure. She began running the necessary programs to thaw John out. In a few minutes he climbed out of the coffin-like cryo chamber. John's skin itched under his armor—a side effect of the cryo process. E turned to the holo-panel where Cortana projected her avatar. "Cortana," he said in his deep voice, "what happened?"

For the first time in weeks, Cortana spoke. "We crash landed on a planet that responded to our distress signal. We need to get out of the ship."

Master Chief nodded and placed his hand over the holo-panel, allowing Cortana to jump to his armor, flooding him with an all to familiar cold feeling. He walked over to the gun rack and grabbed an MA5C Assault Rifle as well as a BR55HB SR Battle Rifle. He attached both of these to the magnetic plating on his back. He also grabbed a few magazines and stowed them on his waist for easy access. In a corner he also found a pair of the Arbiter's Plasma Rifles, which he attached to his leg plating.

"Pop the hatch," he said, satisfied with his armament. Water flooded the ship and Master Chief walked outside into the lakebed. His heavy armor allowed underwater movement, which made it easy to look around. The lake bed was made of jet black rock, with patches of phosphorescent blue material scattered throughout. He walked over to one of these patches and his shields flickered.

"My sensors indicate high levels of radioactivity in this material. The armor should keep you safe as long as your shield stays up," said Cortana inside John's helmet.

"That would have been nice to know _before_ I got close to it, Cortana."

"Sorry. If it makes you feel better, I did an analysis of our environment. The air is breathable and gravity is roughly 80 that of Earth's. You should be able to make it to the surface if you jump."

John rolled his eyes inside his helmet, tensed the muscles in his legs and jumped. The armor increased his jump power 100 fold and he broke the surface, landing on the edge. The weight of the armor cracked the rocks he landed on and it crumbled back into the water as he stepped forward. The surrounding area didn't look much different from the lake bed; jagged rocks formed a cliff in front of him, also patched with the same glowing blue material. It was everywhere. The ground, however, was for the most part smooth, with the exception of a few jagged rocks here and there. There were no signs of life or even water other than the lake which was now at his back. He turned around and saw that it went for miles, well beyond his vision. John chuckled. "I swear Cortana, only you could fly a rock into the only damn water source on a planet you have no data on."

"Oh shut up. We need to get moving. I am still transmitting our signal; maybe whoever sent the response is still listening."

"I think they might have _heard_ us arrive," he replied back jokingly. Cortana was silent. John walked, his boots making soft thuds on the rocky ground. There was a large crevice in the cliff we now walked towards; he reluctantly walked into its shadow and switched on the shoulder lights on his armor. Pebbles crumbled down the wall to his right and John drew the battle rifle, pointing it up to the top of the crevice. He scoped in to get a better look, but there was only more of the black rock with a rather large patch of the blue material. Something that caught his eye though was a patch of material that resembled the delta waypoints Cortana placed on his HUD. It also slightly resembled an uppercase "Y." It was somewhere in between the two characters. John stared at it for a moment then lowered and holstered the rifle and continued through the crevice. He couldn't shake the feeling that someone was watching him though…and it made him nervous.

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About fifteen minutes of walking in the dark, the cliffs opened out into a clearing. Relieved to see the light again, John cut the power to his suit lights. As he progressed into the clearing, he took a look around. There were still no signs of life, just more rocky outcroppings and the strange radioactive material. Movement on his motion sensor caught his attention and he whipped around to face it, assault rifle drawn. "No life signs detected," said Cortana.

"IFF (Infrared Friend or Foe) tags are blank too," added John. He just about turned around again when he saw the same blue delta symbol in the rocks on the cliff face. He primed the rifle and pointed at the rocks.

"I know you're there, show yourself!"

A humanoid being emerged from the cliff face, standing just over six feet tall with the blue delta appearing to be the visor on its helmet, large shoulder armor glowing with the blue material, and seamless black armor that had a strange dark blue hue to it, as if the material was integrated into it. The being stood still for a moment, then raised its right arm. The arm had a hole in the end like the hunters, and it began to glow. Master Chief knew better than that and took evasive maneuvers. The being ran with him and fired beams of energy that slightly tracked the Master Chief, like the needler would. The Master Chief returned fire and the being shrugged it off like the bullets weren't even hitting it. Master Chief switched to a plasma rifle and tried that. The being flinched as the superheated plasma seared its armor and hit the insides underneath. The being stopped firing and stood still for a moment. Master Chief fired until the rifle overheated. The being took all of it, and a haunting inhuman laughter emanated from it. The laughter echoed off the rocks and then the being exploded, leaving just a fine blue mist hanging in the air.

"That was odd," said Cortana.

John said nothing, just nodded and turned around. Cortana kept talking. "The creature seemed to be made of various metals and the blue material. It had no life signs at all. Its technology is nothing like I have ever seen before. It's far more advanced than the covenant weapons or even forerunner tech, yet it seems to be based on forerunner. I will need more data to confirm this."

"Well let's hope we don't have to run into another one of those for you to get that data," replied John.

John walked across the clearing and into the rocky fields and mountains, hoping to find some form of friendly life. His signal continued to broadcast, but with no response.

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High above the planet's orbit, a black ship with a green cockpit intercepted the signal from the surface. The ship's AI interpreted it as a distress signal and changed course for the planet's surface and began running thaw out procedures for the pilot. On the surface several miles away, a facility also picked up the signal and alerted its inhabitants to the presence of the intruder. They began procedures for immediate mobilization.

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**A/n: I hoped you liked the first chapter. More should be on the way shortly. This is an AU crossover fic, you will find out with what in the next chapter. To give you a little hint, turn this ship black and you have to one approaching the planet. http://img423.imageshack.us/img423/4567/mp3ship3ze.jpg**

**And of course:**

**Disclaimer: I do not claim to own halo or any of the characters used within. They belong to Bungie, and I am not making any money off of this story.**


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